5 New Rules To Winning The Customer Loyalty Game In The Digital Age

As a keynote speaker who travels internationally, educating audiences on how to do business and win hearts and minds in the digital age, one of the things I regularly encounter is confusion over how to assess and cultivate the loyalty of customers. Traditionally, the approach to creating customer loyalty has had a particular formula and countenance. It looked like a mix of good advertising, good values, and good product. And though that formula is still important, there are other considerations that businesses can’t afford to neglect.

In fact, according to Accenture Strategy’s new brand loyalty/marketing report, 78% of U.S. consumers are withdrawing their loyalty at rates that bleed the profit margin and are quicker than three years ago. Some other brutal statistics include: 54% of customers switched providers in the last year, and 8% claimed that initiatives geared towards fostering loyalty were actually a turn off.

Whether the change is caused by the unique temperament of millennials, or the expansion of the marketplace in the Digital Age, customers appear increasingly fickle and unpredictable. So, what are the new rules of the loyalty game?

1. Measure loyalty in behavior. Actions speak louder than words. Rather than using customer satisfaction reports to measure and predict loyalty, look to instances of brand advocacy and activity on social media. Accenture’s researchers discovered that of the most loyal customers, over 50% recommended brands to others, while 14% overall expressed their feelings, both positive and negative, through posts on social media. In some ways, advocacy is the new loyalty. And to leverage its potential, brands must begin to see their best customers as champions of their brand, champions whose voices can be used instrumentally to convert others and spread awareness.

2. Intercept the “consumer decision journey” at strategic points. The “consumer decision journey” is the trajectory taken by a customer as they assess various brands, choose their favorite, and either stick to it, or revert back to reassessing. It’s critical that companies have enough visibility to make it into the initial set of candidates and equally important that they present a robust enough profile of perks to fend off competition.

While working with the revolutionary communication platform — Sococo, our social media agency used well-researched and well-crafted webinars to put the company on the map. We then complemented those efforts with a robust blog and extensive social media engagement. Since customers have more options than ever, the onus is on companies to know their competition and remain vigilant and on brand, particularly during key moments in the consumer decision journey.

3. Learn to speak “millennial.” Weighing in at 1.8 billion of the world’s population, millennials are also expected to have a lifetime value of $10 trillion.This substantial segment of the population requires a distinct tact and diplomacy. Many millennial values can seem counterintuitive to old school marketers, but they’re not impossible to track and understand. As a generation that grew up with identity politics and social media networks, it makes sense that millennials would depend more heavily on transparency and self-expression.

When working with the iconic men’s brand, Haggar, we leveraged relationships with partners such as the Pro Football Hall of Fame and the Hockey Hall of Fame to increase Haggar’s appeal to millennials by engaging fans through custom content and contests.